Spurious Serpent, Chapter 1
Jan. 7th, 2018 08:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sinnatiousSummary: Sequel to Fallacious Deity. With both Chaos and Cosmos dead, the surviving warriors try to find a way home.
Author's Note: I never finished or posted this sooner because I was never satisfied by the quality of it or the direction it went, nor felt the need for it to exist beyond being some sort of bridge between Fallacious Deity and all of the 'returning home' prompts I got from all the giftfics back in the day. I don't like doing sequels and this fic 100% exemplifies why. There's not much to this beyond a bit of very old, un-betaed wordspew that I'm posting half in celebration of the upcoming console release of Dissidia NT and half to get it out of my head to make room for new and hopefully better things. So it's going to be pretty unpolished and very rough and slapdash, as fair warning, but figured this might be a good place to get back into posting.
My New Year's resolution of sorts was to try to post something once a week regardless of quality, at least until I run out of backlog. But I'm also not going to hold myself too strictly to that and beat myself up about it, so yeah, fair warning there, I could fall off the wagon again at any moment. Real life > Fandom life, and I've not always been good at balancing that in the past. But I've also dearly, dearly missed writing and posting and I figure taking a more casual approach to it will net the best of both worlds, and hopefully if anyone is still around they might get some enjoyment from reading.
Anyway now that I have hopefully tempered expectations, here's some fic!
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Chapter 1
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Grey clouds swirled like smoke across a permanently dusky sky. Rolling hills clothed in sickly green grass and patches of dull rock stretched out before them, intersected by shallow streams and the occasional set of decrepit stone columns.
It was utterly silent, save for the murmur of wind and distant gush of water.
And occasionally, very occasionally, the tromping of boots on earth, and the clash of steel on crystal.
As the manikin crumbled into shards of quartz, Cloud hefted the Buster Sword back to its customary spot on his shoulder. Five other warriors gathered around, each vigilant, though there was little need to be. Aside from the ever-rarer manikin, Cornelia Plains was quiet, tranquil and most of all… empty.
"Hmph. Nothing except manikins and moogles," Squall muttered.
Terra clasped a hand to her chest, staring into the distance. “It’s so…”
“Boring!” Tidus interrupted, kicking a blitzball in front of him. “We’ve been walking around for weeks already. Come on!” He let loose a piercing whistle that made Cloud wince, as though the sound could actually summon a magical chariot to cross dimensions.
“Be serious,” Onion Knight lectured, hands on his hips and helmet plumes swaying in the breeze.
“I am being serious,” Tidus replied with an eye roll and easy smile. How he could grin like that after everything that had happened… “Don’t tell me I’m the only one sick of cleaning up manikins!”
Squall muttered something that might have been agreement. Cecil remained quiet, off to the side. He typically didn’t contribute unless prompted. He wore the guilt over Golbez’s ultimately pointless sacrifice like an invisible armour, and nothing – not even Tidus’s antics – could easily breach it.
The six of them had wandered the southern continent somewhat aimlessly since Cosmos’s demise, destroying what few lingering manikins remained. At first, it had simply been a matter of waiting-and-seeing, after Shinryuu’s fiery tail had lashed the sky and the bodies of the fallen vanished. But when Cosmos didn’t reappear, and neither did their fallen comrades, born anew…
Cloud was used to being alone, but never had the world seemed quite so sparse before. Six, out of what had once been two dozen, forty, a hundred.
“-What do you think?”
He blinked, having lost track of the conversation at some point, to find everyone looking at him expectantly. “About what?”
Squall huffed, scowling at his inattention. “About what we should try next,” Terra explained softly, acting as peacemaker.
“You still know this world best,” Onion Knight reasoned. “If anyone’s going to have an idea, it’ll be you.”
There was some truth to that. Cloud mulled it over for a moment. “…Maybe we should try talking to the moogles.”
Terra’s eyes lit up, and Onion Knight frowned. “Moogles? Would they really know anything?”
It was a fair point – As a general rule, moogles weren’t the brightest bunch, and rarely seemed capable of looking beyond their own bobbles.
“They were here even when I first turned up,” Cloud said. “And they gossip, and dealt with both sides. They might know something.”
“It’s a good idea,” Cecil said softly into the following silence.
Tidus shrugged. “I guess we don’t have anything else to do. Let’s get going.”
Squall’s scowl deepened, but he came along anyway. “Tch. Whatever.”
………………..
It didn’t take that long to find a moogle. If Squall hadn’t heard otherwise, he would have thought they were territorial creatures – he’d never seen two together, and they always tended to roam the same areas.
The moogle in question ambled in a lazy circle of eight around the remains of what had probably once been a gateway. When they approached, his flight grew erratic, tiny little bat wings fluttering so fast they were almost a blur.
"Oooh, customers, kupo! You ought to buy something, kupo!"
It said something very profound about moogles that in the face of total desolation, the first thing they worried about was profits.
“Moglin?” Terra asked with an unusually bright smile and stars in her eyes. Squall eyed her dubiously. Who could tell moogles apart?
“Uhhhh, yeah, that’s me, kupo. You’ve got good eyes, lady! Did you hear about my great store? It’s still kind of small, but I’m building it up, kupo!”
With what? Near as Squall could tell, they were the only customers in the whole damn world.
“I’m sure it will be great!” Terra said earnestly. “But we were hoping you could answer some questions…”
Tidus grinned, and at Squall’s glance, whispered, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen her this excited, hey.”
It was embarrassing, really. Or maybe a girl thing. At least it meant they could leave the interrogation to her. Provided she didn’t lose track and start cuddling the thing, or trading all the materials in their pockets for pebbles.
It was probably just a waste of time, anyway.
While Terra sweet-talked the moogle, Squall kept an eye out for manikins, or anything else out of the ordinary. Until recently, this world had been about survival. And survival had, like it or not, meant fighting with numbers, and always, always, watching your back.
Cecil lingered on the edge, as usual. Squall didn’t really get the guy – hadn’t had much to do with him in the one cycle he could remember. He’d dealt mostly with Zidane and Bartz and the Warrior of Light – all of whom had bit the dust. He tried not to think about it. Casualties of war were to be expected, and grief was unproductive.
Who did that leave him with, though? Some bratty know-it-all kid. A timid girl. Tidus was annoying too, always cheerful and never seeming to take anything seriously, even after everything that happened. And then there was that Cloud guy, also hanging back, watching everything with those creepy glowing eyes of his.
Squall didn’t trust him. They’d fought on the same side when the gauntlet had been thrown down, but that didn’t count. He’d been with Chaos. And he was strong, too. All the more reason to be careful.
"What about the Mured Moogle, kupo?" Terra had apparently made some headway.
Onion Knight cocked his head in thought. “Mured Moogle?”
“Yeah! He’s not like the other moogles, kupo! He’s real smart, kupo!”
“Well, where is he then?” Tidus prodded, all but bouncing on the balls of his feet, like an athlete warming up for a sprint.
“I have no idea kupo!”
Squall wanted to drown himself. Anything to get away from these idiots.
His glare apparently pierced even the haze of greed and bubble of confusion the moogle cheerily flew in. “Oh, uh, but one of the other moogles might know, kupo! Don’t hurt me, kupoooo!”
Terra clapped her hands, looking faintly delighted by the prospect.
Great. Now it looked like they were going moogle hunting.
What a waste of time.
………….
Cloud revelled in a long, internal sigh.
The Southern Islands were large, and many of the teleport crystals had gone dull and unresponsive. So they were often stuck to travelling by foot, which would have been fine if it weren’t for the fact that moogles apparently had some great big aversion to sharing retail space with each other and so spread themselves ridiculously far apart. It was, at best, a minimum of a day’s travel between them.
At least Terra was enjoying herself.
“Hey, hey lady! Go easy on the fur would you? Kupoooooooo.”
Onion Knight and Tidus seemed to be, too. Onion Knight most likely because anything that made Terra happy made him happy, and Tidus… Cloud hadn’t quite figured that out, yet. Tidus had been moody for the first few days after… after everything, but he’d bounced back surprisingly quickly. Too quickly, even. Cecil was still grieving for Golbez, who’d died much earlier – how was it that Tidus could brush aside his father’s death so easily?
Not that Cloud minded – he was grateful, in fact. He just didn’t quite understand.
“The Mured Moogle? Can’t say I know much, kupo. Hey, you gonna buy something or what?”
Honestly speaking, he didn’t understand much about his current companions. They’d been travelling together for weeks now, and he still didn’t.
It didn’t matter, though, so long as they could find a way home.
“I heard there’s a really deep gateway near Melmond Fens,” the latest moogle – Cloud had already forgotten his name – said. “Maybe the Mured Moogle’s there, kupo?”
Terra hugged the moogle tight to her chest – was it his imagination, or did both the moogle and Onion Knight start blushing? “Thank you! You’ve been a big help.”
They convened in a loose circle once they were out of the moogle’s sight. “What do you think?” Onion Knight asked. “This deep gateway sounds kind of suspicious.”
Cloud looked off into the distance. "We should probably check it out." In his experience, deep gateways were usually inhabited – most members of Chaos’s ranks would choose one and make it their base throughout the cycle, seeking comfort and familiarity in reflections of their home dimension. Cloud himself had used them more than once for hiding, back when the world was fuller and it felt like he couldn’t cross an open space without being beset by an enemy.
Squall scowled. "We should be finding a way home. How sure are we this isn’t another cactuar-chase?” Cloud was briefly distracted by the realisation that cactuars, or at least some variant of them, were common to all of their words, given the lack of request for clarification. “The moogles haven’t exactly been helpful so far.”
Cecil hesitated, and then quietly remarked, “Melmond Fens is quite a ways from here...”
The Melmond region was a rather secluded part of the southern islands, far to the west, surrounded by water and the mountain range home the Cavern of Earth. There weren’t many safe routes to get there – the path would invariably involve passing through numerous gateways, any of which could contain lingering manikins. They were looking at close to a fortnight’s journey, assuming they didn’t find any functioning crystals to speed their way.
Tidus shrugged. “Does it matter? Not like we’re in a rush or have a time limit, right? What does it hurt?” He sounded genuinely cheerful about it.
That appeared to only make Squall angrier. “Are you even taking this seriously?” He didn’t raise his voice, but his words were as sharp as his gunblade. “Do you want to stay in this hellhole?”
The blitzballer stiffened, and a moment too late to be natural, turned offended. “I just don’t see the point in getting uptight about it! We don’t have any better leads, and we’re not on the clock! If we’ve really been here as long as he says-” Tidus threw his hand in Cloud’s direction. “-then what the hell does a few more weeks matter, huh?”
Squall’s glare could have frozen magma. The others had fallen uncomfortably silent as the blitzballer and gunblader faced off. Cloud wondered if he was going to have to break up a fight, or if he’d be better off just letting them both at it.
It turned out to be neither. Abruptly, Squall turned on his heel. “That does it. I’m out.”
“What?!” Onion Knight exclaimed. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m through with this. You can waste your time hunting moogles. I’ll find a way home myself.”
“But… you can’t just leave!” Onion Knight sputtered. “Shouldn’t we be sticking together? For safety?”
Squall scoffed. “Safety from what? There’s nothing dangerous left aside from us.” He pointed his blade at Cloud – Cloud, for his part, shifted to allow quick access to his sword, but didn’t take the gesture as a threat. “This guy is probably your biggest worry. Makes more sense to strike out on your own, at this point.”
“Hey, it’s thanks to him Chaos even died in the first place!” Tidus defended. Cloud just remained silent. He had no place in this discussion.
Squall frowned, hoisting his gunblade back on his shoulder. “Whatever. I’m done. Good luck chasing moogles.” And with those pointed words, Squall stalked away, bomber jacket ruffled by the cool breeze.
“Wait, Squall!” Onion Knight pleaded, looking to the rest of them in disbelief.
Tidus shrugged, the motion jerky with anger. “What do you want us to do, squirt? He’s obviously made up this mind.”
Terra hesitated, biting her lip. “Maybe someone should go with him?”
Cloud eyed the leather-clad figure heading into the distance.
With this stunt, he thought he might have understood Squall a little better. A lone-wolf type.
Except wolves were pack creatures at heart. But Squall could figure it out for himself later. Even Cloud wasn’t hypocritical enough to lecture anyone about that.
“It’s up to you,” he said. “But I think he’ll be fine. If we find the Mured Moogle, I’m sure we’ll be able to meet up with him again.” Cloud turned west, and started walking.
One by one, the others picked up to trail him – Terra and Onion Knight sending one last worried glance at Squall’s retreating back before hurrying to catch up, Cecil drifting behind them. Tidus remained for several long moments, face turned to the sky, eyes closed, fists clenched, but before they got too far away, turned to follow.
A strained silence floated over the party, broken only by the beat of footsteps. Cloud was used to silence, but this one made him feel oddly uneasy.
Everyone’s tempers were frayed from the loss and confusion of Cosmos’s fall, and then the aimless wandering after that. It was understandable. But they had a destination now, and a lead, however flimsy. Things were bound to smooth over and settle down. They all shared a common goal, after all.
He just wished he could shake the feeling that this was but the first fracture in their tiny little group of survivors. He only hoped they could last until they found a way home.
Still around, definitely still enjoying :)
Date: 2018-01-07 12:16 am (UTC)Re: Still around, definitely still enjoying :)
Date: 2018-01-07 04:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-01-08 12:38 pm (UTC)I'm enjoying the POVs.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-14 08:40 am (UTC)